Why Polar Bears are Such Weird Animals
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- Опубліковано 15 вер 2024
- Polar bears are so famous that we sometimes forget that they are actually incredibly unusual animals. From the amount of time they evolve in to the way they live, there is very little about polar bears that could be considered as normal. This video explains what it takes for bears to live in such an extreme part of the world.
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Polar Bears truly gained my respect when I sat down and truly thought about how badly inhospitable the arctic is for most lifeforms. Not only they have to live in perpetually cold conditions, but they often have to dive into icy cold waters in order to catch their prey. It’s just insane all around, they’re some of the toughest veterans on the planet!
Polar bears would probably think that we are pretty extreme living in "intolerable" heat all the time.
It's ironic you call them veterans because they are one of the youngest large animals species ,
True holocene animals ...
Check out Snow Leopard hunting.
@@theobserver9131 populations are growing southwards. Its a long way until being inhospitable to them
what about these black bears then that can survive arctic and hot? how superhuman are they?
Something you didn’t mention is how they have adapted the ability to reduce reflection from the sun on the ice. When you look at a massive ice sheet and it’s glistening like a flashlight on a mirror and you won’t be able to see anything out there, but polar bears have some sort of extra layer on their eyes that eliminates that reflection so they can see everything. It helps them stay hidden and hunt because their prey can’t see them because of the reflection, but the polar bear can always see it’s prey.
Omg polar bears have POLARizing eyes?!
Anti Snow Blindness!
Damn
I was confused to learn that brown bears were the biggest land predator, because polar bears were bigger, but polar bears aren't land mammals, it turns out.
Also polar bears are really a subspecies of brown bears it seems
@@diabl2masterNot a subspecies of Brown bears, they are genetically different and are two full species (for now😉). Brown bear is (Ursus arctos), Polar bear is (Ursus maritimus) so only the same genus (Ursus). Subspecies would be the like the Eurasian brown bear (Ursus arctos arctos), and the American brown bear (Ursus arctos horribilis), first word in the scientific name name is genus, second is species, third is subspecies.
Personally i don't consider them marine mammals, maybe semi marine at a push, they spend there life at "sea" on ice. When ice is thin or non existent they are forced back to land, not a issue for other true marine mammals, cubs aren't really adapted to sea live and when there is very little ice they often drown trying to follow there mother, personally imo there's still to much ground reliance (in there case ice) to be called true marine mammals, as due to lack of ice they are being pushed back onto land, not further out to sea.
@@zebedeemadness2672 The problem is what kind of species definition? If the polar bears are a monophyletic clade, that would imply the grouping of brown bears in paraphyletic. At the least, you would have to separate brown bears into one or more extant species, and a ancient chronospecies that disappeared at the time of the speciation event that led to polar bears.
@@fbkintanar It's based on genetic and morphological data, they aren't the same species only the same genus, genetics done on Brown bears puts all Brown bears as the same species with subspecies, Brown bears with minor morphological or genetic differences are split into subspecies, with subspecies being below species but above locality, meaning they are potentially on there way to becoming full species given the right chacges (genetic isolation, environment etc) to allow them to evolve into a full species, as of what's already with the Polar bears, that was once ancestrally a Brown bear locality, then a subspecies, now a full species.
My favorite polar bear behavior is an ambush technique they use on the sea ice. When waiting at a breathing hole they place a paw in front of their big black nose to camouflage it from seals.
How do they know they have a black nose???
@@louisasmiles probably just evolved or learned behavior because it makes them more successful
They look in the mirror@@louisasmiles
Might be just a legend. I've heard it, too, but who has seen it?
@@ulalaFrugilega I read about the behavior years ago, I can't remember what the source was.
there's something utterly terrifying in the dissonance on polar bear's almost innocent looking black round eyes and cute face and the fact that they are the only bear species who commonly hunt humans upon encounter. if i ever saw one i would truly have to hold myself not to pat them.
The domestication of European people’s has been a disaster to mankind. You’re like neotenous dogs, incapable of recognising danger and distancing yourselves from it. Something I see other equatorial races are innately capable of due to coevolving with megafauna to modernity.
@@kiuk_kiks oh look it's the spirit of Christmas
@@Eye_Exist
I just love biology, and evolutionary psychology. It’s a peculiarity I’ve learned about people go European and even north East Asian people. You as a people have no real fear of animals, despite their size. Equatorial people are though, speaking in generalities.
@@kiuk_kiks 😎👍
My best friend felt the same way about panda bears until I reminded her that it was indeed a bear by showing her a picture of its mouth/teeth. That cured her real quick!
There is an extinct subspecies of Polar Bear called Ursus maritimus tyrannus that lived in Britain during the Late Pleistocene. It was found from a single ulna bone near Kew Bridge, London. The ulna itself measured 48.5 cm long which is bigger than modern Polar Bear (36-43 cm). However, some scientists have disputed its existence as the bone might belong to a Brown Bear rather than Polar Bear. But based on its size, it was still a relatively large species of unknown bear.
Cool info, thabks for sharing 👌
Why would they think it was a brown bear ulna when polar bears are larger than brown bears? That seems silly to me. On average, brown bear ulnas are 24-31 cm, while polar bear ulnas measure 36-43 cm as you mentioned.
@@MesozoicZac Some of them think the measurement is exaggerated.
@@MesozoicZacthe difference in size isn’t nearly enough to justify the bear being closer to brown bears than polar bears or vice versa. An analysis of its adaptations to water would be a more reliable way
@@MesozoicZacthat's like saying Rock Hyraxes are more closely related to squirrels because of their size when their closest evolutionary relatives are elephants.
Or saying that the evolutionary ancestors of whales and dolphins are seals or sharks when it's a hoofed animal.
Amazing to think that in a hypothetical world they could go a mega seal-like evolutionary route eventually
I'm hoping they evolve wings
I feel like it's almost a guarantee some offshoot of them do become more and more aquatic. They can already swim large distances, withstand cold water temps with blubber and hunt aquatic life. It may not even happen in the artic maybe some branch of them travel south along the shallows of the sea for some time
i dont think polar bears can do that for the same reason penguins have stayed in the antarctic for so many years. I think its something like 150m years penguins have existed for and not once have they reached the arctic@@kozmikhero6749
@@kozmikhero6749 it is very unlikely for polar bears to turn fully aquatic anytime soon, this is because the ocean is a dessert with it's life underground and the perfect disguise above. which is an issue because polar bears can't actually drink salt water, they'd have to move into rivers, which are rarely deep enough for a polar bear to swim in full time.
@@windhelmguard5295 Never thought I'd see a reference to Horse With No Name on a video about polar bears...
It is crazy that humans might be older species than polar bears
eh. hey are basically bears with few adaptations
Homo sapiens just have some luck by exterminating Neanderthal, Denisovans, etc to stay older
Anatomically modern humans (could be raised today and there be no way to tell difference) are about 150k years old. There's got to be other species that are newer.
@@rickwrites2612lots
@@rickwrites2612just prior to that, what were they looking like? A little more chimpy? 😂
Such beautiful creatures. I know, dangerous, hunts humans, all that... but just look at the damn thing! Truly majestic. It is no wonder they are such large targets of conservation efforts.
It is sad that they will become extinct in the wild this century, probably in my lifetime. They need long periods with sea ice to get enough calories each year and on land the brown bears habitat is taking over where polar bears once thrived.
Believe it or not there is a video, I believe from Churchill in Canada, of polar bears “playing” with domesticated dogs.
ua-cam.com/video/JE-Nyt4Bmi8/v-deo.htmlsi=JkvBKE2kO7ck4581
Its a gigant. They are hjuge, most just dont realize this because the glaciers and seas are even hjuger.
@@ryuuguu01 An animal that relies on sea ice was always doomed as the earths climate has and always will change from hot to cold and back again. Still sad though non the less. I assume the remaining species will be forced inland and will breed with grizzles.
@@yogaflame7884 True the sun will eventually expand out to envelope the earth destroying all life and dooming so really nothing you do matters.
It’s so cruel how cute and fluffy and cuddly and adorable they look. Every instinct to hug them is activated.
That's all bears. The crazy part is most of the time they don't even seem aggressive until they knock you down, put a heavy paw on your chest, and start chewing away at you while you scream. They are nonchalant even when they're killing you. The complete opposite of big cats.
Unless you are 15 feet tall, with appropriate musculature, I wouldn't try it :)
@@T1OracleChad Bear vs Virgin Big Cat
You won’t want to hear hug once you smell the carnivore
Careful you'll get floofed to death!
In Finnish we call them Jääkarhu. Jää = Ice, Karhu = Bear. I think that that name fits them well too.
most of Europe call them Icebears
is karhu a common name for people? i know a trackmania player named karhu whos finnish, and i also know bjorn is a common name in scandinavia, so is karhu a name too?
@@shadoww7301 Karhu is not a common name at least to humans. There's a very popular beer brand named Karhu though and also a company that makes sports gear (They were the ones who came up with the 3 stripes that Adidas uses).
Also using Karhu as a nick name for things is not too uncommon.
@@shadoww7301 Karhu is not a popular name for people, but Otso, which means the same thing, is relatively popular name.
In Kurdish we call them Wirçê Sipî (white bear)
One of the best channel on UA-cam, thank you for this excellent content, rigorously scientific, and extremely compelling
Dude, I really wish your videos were one hour long.
I also wish I would be in a better financial situation so as to reward your great job as it deserves
Same
I used to think this about a lot of creators then I just started making small donations. If everyone that thought this would just make the effort to a $2-5 contribution it would more then likely make a big difference for theses guys. Probably the difference between needing a “day job” and full time “creator”. You can normally set up monthly contributions of $2. Which seems so small but when they have “X” amount guaranteed it makes it twice a valuable. Just some of my thoughts about donating. I’ve started setting up monthly contributions of $2-5. For about 8 creators, I know it helps them a lot more than I miss less the $40.
@@txkoutdoorfam6911nigga get a savings wtf
I know right, think about how much information he cut or simplified that we could enjoy instead 😁
Don't worry, lol
He makes more than you then
So in other words, they're actual *SEA BEARS*
Bugs or Bears, your videos are always so interesting, so informative, and so well narrated. I always watch them with delight. Thank you and Merry Christmas! I really enjoyed your Christmas bear gift.
Bugs or Bears could be a neat band name 🤪
What I've wondered but have never found an answer to: Surely the appearance of this totally novel way of life would have caused many species to go extinct? I would think there would have been a lot of seal species that couldn't handle the ice suddenly turning from a safe haven to a feeding ground.
Quite a possible theory although as stated in the vid many fossils and non fossil remains are lost to the ocean so we may never know
Most animals in the wild will find themselves in an equilibrium with their surroundings. Polar bears simply couldn't spread if there wasn't enough food in the food chain.
@@ingvarhallstrom2306 Which isn't the same thing as every species living in harmony, nothing driving anything else extinct.
I love that you throw in extant animals in your video, it is great to have the variety.
Extinct*
??
I've had a theory running through my head for a while that polar bears are probably transitionary animals - effectively evolving into a unique niche that will give their descendants opportunities to either take advantage of a purely aquatic or purely terrestrial environment. There's a good chance that if seals weren't already taking the niche of smaller aquatic predators right now, polar bears might just snag that role, and could potentially even evolve to become much more aquatic just so they can better hunt seals without relying on the sea ice all the time (purely speculation).
Also it doesn't surprise me at all that polar bears evolved so fast, there's a chance evolution happens much faster than what most people assume. There's a species of unique raptors called Snail Kites in Florida/Southeast US that have been endangered due to their preferred food being outcompeted by a much larger species of invasive snail brought in from Asia. Within just two generations (maybe even one, given the population was crashing to such low numbers) their beaks adapted to become much larger and more easily able to pierce the shell to get at the larger snails. Given how few of them there were at the time and how quickly they bounced back, it ultimately shouldn't have been possible and is quite an impressive feat.
You are my favourite channel on UA-cam by a landslide. I’m pretty sure I’ve watched every one of your videos multiple times over the years lol. Awesome work. Thankyou:)
The best thing about polar bears is that they are super friendly and are open to cuddles.
I've seen videos where they roll over like puppies when you rub them under the chin.
Only condition is, you need to be a polar bear yourself
😂😂😂
They are, the Vikings had them as pets, as they did with regular brown bears.
Polar bears were for important people, while brown bears for the commoners. It was so common special laws had to be invented, as people seemed to tell their bears to kill their annoying neighbors quite often, and then got acquitted from murder since the bear did it 😂
@@NotASeriousMoose I live above the arctic circle in Finland and ive never heard of polar bears here but i think its mostly because they dont live in these regions. There is some in northern parts of Russia, but in scandinavia? Not on any mainland. Sounds a bit unbelievable, even if it would have been plausible.
In German they are called "Eisbären" which means Ice bears.
Seems very fitting.
Same in Dutch: 1 ijsbeer/ 2 ijsberen
The pronunciation is pretty much the same I guess.
In Russian they are called "белый медведь" which means white bear.
@Brinta3 it's crazy how easy it is to speak German ad a native English speaker as long as you ignore the written language and just focus on pronunciation
Polar bears still retain the ability to scavenge non-meat foods, though I imagine their body uses it less efficiently. This is a problem for Canada's northern communities. There was even a story from a few years ago when several tons of sour grain was dumped, then a polar bear ate it and got drunk.
The best thing I learned about polar bears from this video is: "The more I think about them, the stranger they get."
What an astonishing evolutionary trait. How do they DO that?!
Your videos always fell too short! I could watch this or any of your video’s topics for hours! I do mean this as a compliment. I love your channel! But would you consider doing a series of longer, more in depth videos?
Thanks for your work and always putting out unique and interesting content.
When a seal escapes a polar bear attack:
"Yeah. I'm glad it was just a sea bear. This circle would never hold back a sea rhinoceros."
Absolutely fascinating creatures.
In case if anybody didn't know, the San Diego Zoo has a polar bear; it is a magnificent thing to see.
So don't Hudson Bay but they don't go out at night with out a gun . Just saying.
I've binge watched every video and got excited when this popped up on my feed.
Fantastic video as always. This one was really interesting. Also, big shout out to the comment section of your videos which is always a treat to read through. I feel at home here.
There's something about this guys voice that i love.
As long as we're dumping huge amounts of plastic into the ocean, we may as well create artificial plastic bergs for seals to rest on and polar bears to hunt from. Furthermore, we should replace the Great Auk with transplanted penguin colonies. It only makes sense and it would help the bears eat, and increase the amount of phosphorous on the rapidly-melting permafrost.
moth light media the kinda guy to make a 10 minute video about bears
It's not even eight minutes , still felt like I learnt so much , even being an animal geek and cetaceans and amphibious mammals are some of my favourite ones .
yeah i wasnt insulting him @@Kmr571-l8y
What an absolutely fascinating video! Thank you so much for making it! Merry Christmas! 🙏🐻❄️🎄🎁💫
Sea Bears are no joke. They are the real deal.
I agree. The only known defense is to draw an anti sea bear circle in the sand.
I once watched footage of one of these monsters dismantling a small Caterpillar vehicle to get at a chocolate bar that had been left inside it. They are truly one of the most fearsome and dangerous Apex Predators on the planet.
What's scarier than a polar bear? A bipolar bear.😊
I share the sentiment of wishing for longer videos, the infomation presented is concise but I'm sure there's more to elaborate on.
Moar please.
It would be interesting to see how polar bear evolution would continue into the future. I predict they would (will?) continue evolving marine features, maybe along similar lines to pinnipeds, and possibly eventually becoming fully aquatic marine apex predators similar to certain whales.
Almost guaranteed they will be extinct very soon
Although they're very at home in the open ocean, they don't seem to do much of their hunting at sea.You may be right but, If the sea ice continues to reduce in size, I think they'll follow the prey. So they'll probably become more common on the nearest land, such as Norway, Canada or maybe even Siberia. That's assuming that the sea ice does disappear. Our climate change could switch at any time, without warning and give us another ice age.
I greatly appreciate your videos ❤❤❤
Q: What is the fur color of a polar-grizzly hybrid?
A: Tan.
Q: What are they called?
A: nanulak
Q: Are they friendly?
A: No. Not at all. Are you crazy?
i'm from Worcester Massachusetts and we had a polar bear at the New England Science Center now the Ecotarium I felt bad for him it gets 90 to 100 degrees in the summer and the pool he had must have been about 80 degrees man did he want to eat us
Very packed with high-quality observations! Thank you.
I would love to see the polar bears continue and evolve for thousands of years, theyre so cool 🥶
Panda: "You think you are weird Bear? You merely adopted it, I was born in it. Molded by it!"
If they almost exclusively prey on predators then there needs to be a Sharknado vs Polar Bearctopus movie.
I came back due to YT and was surprised how good it was to hear (and, to some extend see) the intro click-boom again. Great content, too.
Only channel where I click the notification immediately!
But how did these Svalbard bears learn to speak and smelt meteoric iron? 😁
Super interesting video
What a fantastic video. Thank you.
I had no idea they were called sea bears.
Happy Holidays, Mothlight
Weird? Bet you won't say that to its face!
I'm a bit confused, you said that Brown Bears would have reached Greenland when there was NO ice, and become isolated when it got colder and the Ice returned, wouldn't the Ice returning mean it could be walked across and thus NOT be isolated...?
A high tolerance to heavy metal:
Just another reason to respect polar bears
I *LOVE* this channel - i think the only channel that competes in the same class is NORTH02.
Another interesting fact: Polar Bears do not hibernate.
They don’t fully hibernate a mother bear can still go 8 months without food
To me this shows that 1) bears are an intelligent species and 2) how hardcore the selection process must have been so that only the most well adapted bears survived.
Bears are not one species.
Bears are the great generalists of our planet
What a brilliant piece of documentation at least 20 things I did not know in this ...thank you.
Never seen a Polar Bear and Orca encounter. Never. Is there on the Internet. That's one giant ass Dolphin.
They adapted to be even more cute than their brown bear cousins
Watching a bear swim that tast and gracefully sends chill down my spine.
Terrifying.
Babe. Wake up. Moth light media dropped.
I love this channel I’ve seen ever video
Great video. Thanks!
Bears are huggable creatures
I wonder if they will become even more marine over the centuries and millennia. Could they start to look like whales or dolphins?
Their environment is probably changing too fast for evolution to keep up. They are more likely go extinct as the planet warms and the ice melts.
I wonder if the Antarctic will stay cooler than the Arctic as the climate changes. I wonder if transplanting some polar bears to the Antarctic might save them from extinction.
That would be pretty shocking to the penguins and seals Down under.
Probably
always love this channel, polar bears rule
More light media dropping another banger as usual
we neeeeeed longer videossssss
They look so cute and fluffy 🤩
Makes me fascinated how we may actually have current fossils of animals that may have actually been adapted to these climates and were the apex predators of this unique ecosystems! Considering like you said how genetically and physically similar they are to most bears, I feel if we had discovered this bear as an extinct species, and the arctic climate no longer existed, would we have known they were ocean specialists, maybe wider and larger feet for spreading on snow is a potential convergent evolutionary trait to look into? More likely than this, How many other skeletons of fascinating marine dependant terrestrial predators on sea ice we’ve missed discovering or haven’t yet!
I wonder how many niches today are pretty much unique through all of life history, and even more so how many of the past niches are completely alien to anything alive today
If they don't go extinct, they'll evolve into whales.
or start swimming south
Your mom evolved into a whale
If they do, then oh whale 🤷♂️
@@blackkitty420😂
My face when i get locked out of the house so I'm forced to become a hyper-predator: 🐻
The vast majority of my diet is also marine animals
I didn't even know brown bears and grizzly bears were of the same species-it all makes more sense with this information.
Brown bear is the parent species. The grizzly is just one of many subspecies of it around the world. For example there are 2 brown bear subspecies in N. America; grizzly and Kodiak, there are several more in Eurasia.
you should start a paetron i’d definitely pay for longer videos. love your content!
In Danish we call them isbjørne, ice bears, quite a fitting name
I never knew that Polar Bears had such an interesting lore!
3:27 Well that dude doing the downward dog is definitely a wierd animal 😂
The latest consensus on the timing of the split between brown bears and polar bears suggests that they started to become distinct species about 1.3 to 1.6 million years ago. This estimate updates prior assessments made by some of the same scientists. Not 350k to 500k years.
Imagine if in a million years polar bears survive and evolve to become a fully aquatic marine mammal.. similar to how seals and whales evolved perhaps we are currently witnessing the transition and earliest phase of such
Because of the polar bear’s niche, do you think it would be possible that they could someday evolve to become more aquatic? Like a platypus or something
Polar bears could be the beginning of a mammalian mosasaur.
wild, so polar bears are kind of reverse crocodiles - crocs are ancient, polar bears are very recent. crocs hunt terrestrial animals from the water, polar bears hunt marine mammals while being terrestrial themselves. Idk, just fun how nature has these weird symmetries sometimes
Very interesting.
I has read somewhere that Penguins are unable to live in the Arctic, because of polar bears.
However Penguins are evolutionally very old. Is there any evidence to support that thesis?
Obviously Penguins made it all the way to the Galapagos Islands and thus approaching the northern hemisphere.
There used to be a penguin like species in the North Atlantic called the Great auk until humans hunted it to extinction. Due to northern land predators they could only breed on remote rocky islands.
Polar Bears: Hi, I’m a Polar Bear! I’m the largest terrestrial carnivore on the planet, and I-
Moth Light Media: Weirdo.
In the Netherlands we call em IJsberen.( ICEbear)
Shoutout to the first brown bear that jumped a seal and decided that was all he wanted to eat for the rest of his life
I'd imagine developing webbing between the toes is a pretty easy evolutionary feat. I imagine this because some of my toes are webbed!
Polar bears are a scary version of leopard seals in the making
it would be interesting to see where polar bear evolution goes far into the future (if they don't end up going extinct that is). would they further their aquatic adaptations and become more seal like?
It's highly unlikely they become more seal like because that ecological niche is already filled. If the Arctic becomes much warmer then many temperate animals will move north. Polar bears will hunt them or their young.
They gained my respect and a new way of looking at our feable human life. Now favorite animal topping penguins
Its amazing to imagine in a few hundred million years if the melting ice caps dont completely wipe them out that a lineage of polar bears could adapt to be completely aquatic mammalian predators. Like a killer whale.
So you’re saying drawing a circle in the ice will save our lives from a Ursus Maritimus attack?
Ursus (m)aritimus
Fun fact, besides crocodiles, polar bears are the only other species that will seek out human prey for food specifically.
These bears have the best sense of smell ever...I guarantee they can smell you right now in your Home
That's ridiculous. They can't smell that good they would be so overwhelmed by smells if that was the case
The arctic: (freezing cold and 90% of the food is underwater)
Bears: .... challenge accepted
Your videos are always great
What are the chances of Polar bears evolving into an actual aquatic species? And how long would it take for noticeable physical change to occur ?
Climate change is giving them a hard time, to say the least , My thought is that they could possibly adapt to the ocean much more (if they have the time)
No way those bears actually evolved webbed paws that is badass
💖love the vid came out in time for my birthday today 💖